Wax
Nothing has ever progressed without building upon the less advanced that existed before it. Everything needs a step upon which to climb and build the next level, continuing forever an endless staircase. Knowledge is no exception, in that it too requires building upon the fundamentals in order to ascend towards the Truth. Building each step requires a pursuit for knowledge through persistent questioning, and ultimately finding a faultless answer. Humanity has progressed only because each person has built upon that which they know, and has questioned every aspect of life. It is this sequence of inquisition and answering that have plagued man since the beginning of time. Rene Descartes introduced a branch of epistemology based on this principle. Descartes required a foundation upon which he could build his knowledge on. He set forth to determine the essential properties by which we define our material world. He theorized that any belief that could be doubted was not cert!ain, and therefore could not be true. In a particular passage from Meditations on First Philosophy, Descartes argues that senses of the body are unable to perceive anything, and that it is only the mind that can do so. He determines this through an "expe
Descartes' Wax Argument presents a problem for empiricists in that it concludes that the senses can be fooled, and that only by rationalizing can one determine the essential properties. Just because we cannot see or realize something, does not mean that it doesn't exist. He ponders what there was in the wax that he thought he understood. The essence an object can manifest itself through the senses, but it is simply a manifestation; not the true essence of the object. The empirical point of view would argue that Descartes' conclusion of the wax arg!ument is flawed. This type of co-dependency, the existence of binary opposition, is the framework of the entire universe, thus truth has many faces, and there is never one right path to absolute truth. Well, each property set is necessary and true to each form. Matter is not unchangeable, and so properties must also change. And an empiricist would definitely argue that Descartes' flaw lies in the fact that he believes material properties should remain unchanged. Descartes understood that the wax could assume infinite shapes, sizes, smells, or textures, but he could not imagine all of them. Descartes basically describes the piece of wax through all of his sensory perceptions. This creates a schism in philosophy when arguing how to determine the essential properties. He investigates a piece of bee's wax that has freshly been taken from a honeycomb. When you boil the water, all of a sudden it is no longer liquid but a gas,! or cool the water, and it becomes solid ice, both with different properties. Like this, the mind cannot evaluate anything without the senses.
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